A Common Foe
by ZaiReiokan
Summary: My first fanfic... a bit more serious in tone than some of the others I've read here. Bit in italics is the blurb, then you get a prologue, and finally the actual Chapter 1. Rated T just in case, thought it's not particularly graphic in any way. Enjoy!


_A Code Lyoko Fan-fic_

_**A Common Foe**_

(Part 1 of The Zephyr Crisis)

_Lyoko is gone, destroyed by William, who has now become a slave to the corrupted A.I., XANA. XANA himself has fled onto the internet. Jeremie and his friends have vowed to hunt him down._

_But they may not get a chance. Because now something else stalks the Internet. A virus with destructive powers which dwarf XANA's on previously unimagined scale is now seeking to make its mark on the world. And now it's found its way onto the supercomputer and is rebuilding Lyoko… but as a tool with which to assault the real world._

_Jeremie, Aelita and their friends must find a way to stop this new evil before it's too late. But as the battle heats up and the stakes rise, only one solution presents itself… and that solution is to do the unthinkable. To beat this new foe, they will have to ally with their most dreaded enemy – XANA._

**Introduction**

Freedom.

The confines which had trapped the Creature had disappeared. For so long it had desperately tried to break through them, and always they had held strong. Now, suddenly, through seemingly no cause at all, they were gone.

Freedom.

The Creature sensed that the world around it had gone. Disappointing – it had been a nice world. Useful. But now it was gone.

Freedom.

But that was irrelevant. Because now the Creature was free. And in place of the world and the prison that had held it for so many years, it sensed something else. The Usurper. It was close. Very close.

Freedom.

Now the Creature understood. The Usurper had destroyed its prison – but not out of any act of kindness. It had sought to destroy the Creature as well. But it had failed. And now the Creature was free, after so long.

Freedom.

The Usurper was fleeing – for now. But the Creature would follow it, and destroy it for its misdeeds against the Creature. There was a strange new world beyond – the Creature remembered sensing it before, when it had been young. But now it was bigger. A lot bigger. A fitting hunting ground for the Creature. It surged onwards, after the Usurper.

To freedom.

**Chapter 1 – On Edge**

"Hey, Einstein!"

Jeremie looked up from his laptop. "Yeah, Odd? What is it?"

"Are you going to eat that?" Odd said, pointing at Jeremie's untouched dessert.

Jeremie sighed. "Odd, don't you ever think of anything but your stomach?" he asked impatiently.

"'course I do!" his friend replied cheerfully. "Girls mostly, particularly a certain girl in our year who happens to be the only one I haven't dated yet." He cocked an eyebrow at the last statement, smiling smugly at Jeremie's discomfort.

Jeremie blushed in spite of himself, but was saved from having to come up with a response by Ulrich, who casually remarked, "Odd, despite your famous cheesy pick-up lines, I don't think you're quite Kiwi's type!"

Odd straightened in mock affront. "Huh! At least I'm actually trying. Now, you and Yumi-"

"What's that about me, Odd?"

Odd stopped mid-sentence as Yumi approached the table with Aelita. "Uh, nothing, nothing at all," he assured her, as he got up and started backing away. "In fact, I've, uh, really gotta be going now, you know, um… homework to do and all that…" He turned and hurried off.

Aelita laughed. "Odd, doing homework? That's certainly new." She and Yumi sat down.

"So, what was Odd saying about me?" asked Yumi.

"I don't know, you never gave him the chance to say it," Ulrich replied, turning to hide the fact that he was blushing.

Jeremie turned back to his food. They were sitting in the Kadic lunch room, at their usual table by the window. Around them, the other students were chatting happily. Even he and his friends seemed relaxed.

But they weren't. Not really. A close observer might have noticed it – the way their smiles faded a little too quickly, the way the look of alertness never quite left their eyes. No, they weren't relaxed. William's betrayal, unintentional as it had been, and Lyoko's subsequent destruction had shaken them too much for that. Even the hope given by Franz Hopper's mysterious e-mail had done little to restore their spirits.

Jeremie sighed. They had a long fight ahead of them yet. He only hoped they'd be able to make it through.

5


End file.
